From Hollywood to Bollywood

By

Abheek Bhattacharya

Updated Aug. 14, 2008 11:59 p.m. ET

"Bollywood calls in Rambo for strike on U.S. cinema." So screamed a recent headline in India about Sylvester Stallone's contract to star in a local movie. Indians are excited about the prospect not only of American influence in Bollywood, India's Hindi-language movie industry, but also of Indian influence in Hollywood. It will take more than Rambo, however, for the world's two largest movie industries to smash cultural barriers in each other's nations.

ENLARGE

Beauty meets brawn: Aishwarya Rai will always be loved in India, even if the country takes a liking to such American stars as Sylvester Stallone.
Associated Press/Kobal Collection

Signing an American movie star is a coup for producer Sajid Nadiadvala and a first for Bollywood. But Mr. Stallone isn't the first American in the movie business to have discovered India. Steven Spielberg's DreamWorks studio is negotiating a $500 million partnership with Mumbai-based Reliance ADA Group. Reliance announced earlier at Cannes that its entertainment division, Reliance Big Entertainment, would also bankroll eight production companies owned by Nicolas Cage, George Clooney and others.

There are high expectations on both sides. Consider "Vivek," a contributor to bollywoodbuzz.in, who thinks the addition of Mr. Stallone to a Bollywood cast might add "more substance" to the local flick. "Substance" is not a word usually associated with Mr. Stallone, who is best known for escapist roles like Rambo and Rocky. But any import from Hollywood may very well bring fresh air to an industry saturated with sequins and song-and-dance routines.

On the flip side, Bollywood's growing ambitions accompany Indian investment in Hollywood. Amit Khanna, chairman of Reliance, says that his company will "approve what goes into production" at the eight companies the Indian multinational is financing. Add to that Reliance's investment in 240 movie screens around the U.S., and suddenly India seems ready to deliver its product in America. Two Reliance-financed Bollywood productions, "Broken Horses" and "Kite," are slated for limited release in the U.S. within the next two years.

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But how real are these expectations? When it comes to globalization, cultures operate differently from economies. India's fast-growing economy may be receptive to foreign investment, but this doesn't mean that its movie business is too. The "Rocky" star is unknown in rural parts of India and is unlikely to prove much of an attraction to the millions of fans who follow their Bollywood stars almost as obsessively as they follow their cricket stars.

Conversely, while the notion of India may charm U.S. investors, average American moviegoers are a different market. Indian productions may fascinate film-studies majors and Manhattan art-house audiences, but it's unclear whether they'll appeal more broadly.

Tyler Cowen, an economics professor at George Mason University in Virginia and author of "Creative Destruction: How Globalization Is Changing the World's Cultures," argues that movies are about familiarity. "A feeling of comfort has to be there" for a movie to succeed, he says. That is the reason that "Americans don't like foreign movies," Mr. Cowen says. A Bollywood movie with Indian cultural themes and actors sells tickets to members of the subcontinent's three-million strong diaspora in the U.S., but not to the average American.

Indian moviegoers, too, are seeking familiarity. So far, Hollywood seems to understand that in India one must do as the Indians do. Last November, Sony Pictures released "Saawariya," the first Indian movie financed from abroad. "Saawariya" has Bollywood written all over it: song, dance, love story -- all the usual ingredients. Hollywood is not about to replace a formula that sells 3.6 billion tickets in India annually.

In India, Hollywood simply cannot be itself. It is unable to compete with a local industry that already churns out more than 1,000 movies a year. With a mere 5% share of the market's revenue, Hollywood's regular American products are considered second-tier. As Mr. Khanna puts it, Hollywood is forced to play by Bollywood's rules. "The days of cultural imperialism are over," he says.

Yet some predict that as India liberalizes, the movie landscape may alter. "If India becomes like Bangalore, then more Indians will start watching Hollywood," Mr. Cowen says, referring to the whiz-bang technology capital of India, populated by upper- and middle-class youth. As more Indians get wealthier, their tastes will reflect those currently exhibited only by the upper classes.

Even then, though, it is unlikely that one industry would replace the other. In India, Hollywood would become at most an alternative form of cinema for a greater number of Indians. Bangalore may love Rambo, but there is no shortage of fanfare for Aishwarya Rai, Bollywood's premier actress, in the city. Americans, too, may one day start warming to Indian culture, but the long reign enjoyed by the likes of Mr. Stallone is not about to end. Globalization can wage a long war to remove barriers between nations, but this is one battle it is not going to win anytime soon.

Mr. Bhattacharya is the Robert L. Bartley fellow at The Wall Street Journal Asia's editorial page.

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